Death Makes Angels of Us All
by PartyhardDrunkard
Summary: Beverly Katz didn't ever give up. Beverly Katz was a fighter. This is what happened between Takiawase and Mukozuke. Mentions of Hannibal Rising and Lady Murasaki.


**Death Makes Angels of Us All**

* * *

"_Oh my god..._"

The words were frantic, whispered in such a hushed tone that she could barely hear her own voice. _Will was right..._ She thought as she stared in horror at the sight of the two women - both suspected to be dead - suspended from chains before her - alive. Miriam Lass and Abigail Hobbs - missing the pieces of them that had been found - stared at her with tear filled eyes and near petrified fear. Abigail was near catatonic. Both of their mouths were duck taped shut. _He was right the whole time._

Her sympathy for the two almost overtook her, she almost ran to help them down and get them out, but Abigail's eyes snapped to a point just behind her, causing her to freeze. Abigail let out a pitiful whimper as Miriam cast her eyes down, both of them starting to cry.

Beverly Katz hadn't expected for Hannibal Lecter to have been home as soon as he was. She thought she would've still had time to slip out, unnoticed, and make a beeline to Jack with the evidence that Will was right literally lying in her palm. Beverly had never thought that Hannibal would be home so early...never thought...

That was just it, though. She didn't _think_ before she jumped. Beverly had just gone to Lecter's house, broken into it, on a whim. A hasty, last second decision that she had convinced herself was harmless enough. God _damn_ her curiosity!

Now, as she turned to face the person that she had actually _defended_ a few hours before, she could feel the black sense of foreboding creeping up her spine. They watched each other like birds of prey. Beverly was strong, determined, unwavering in her sharp gaze. Lecter's was dark and sinister. The man's body language was shockingly similar to something out of a supernatural horror film like The Evil Dead. Though Beverly held the man's blank stare with defiance, she could feel her insides quivering. She knew..._she knew_...she had no chance of making it out alive.

Suddenly, he touched the wall and lunged to the side with startling speed. Beverly raised her gun and shot at him as quickly as she could. She was an amazing shot, one of the best at the BAU. But even Beverly Katz can't hit a moving target in the dark. There was a clank and the last little slivers of light disappeared as the steel door closed. If she wasn't trapped before, she definitely was now.

All ounces of calm left her and soon, she was just shooting blindly in the dark.

_2, 3_

Beverly Katz's hands were shaking as she pulled the trigger on her Glock. Hannibal Lecter could smell her fear. It betrayed her location in the dark.

_4, 5_

Lecter's footfalls were noiseless as he stalked toward her.

_6, 7_

Katz could feel the fear tightening in her heaving chest. Hannibal swung his arm out, catching the Asian's stomach in a hammer punch. The breath was knocked from her as she let out a pained and terrified yelp. She stumbled backward as her long hair tumbled out of its ponytail, raising her gun to the ceiling. _I was here, Jack. Look. Do you see?_

**BAM.**

_8_

Out of bullets and out of options, Beverly still couldn't have been more proud of herself. She had been smart enough to figure out who Hannibal Lecter _really_ was. _She_ had found the Ripper. _She_ had found the Copycat. _She_ had done it.

As Beverly straightened her back, her eyes caught the ray of light shining down into the darkness of the basement. Through her fear and sadness, she felt a ghost of a smile flicker across her face. Hannibal Lecter entered her line of sight and her eyes floated to his, staring at him with quiet defiance still lighting up her eyes. Hannibal had to admire her bravery. Even when faced with unavoidable death and mutilation, she didn't give up her will to live. She may have been resigned that it was going to happen, but she hadn't given up. In Hannibal's mind, someone like that didn't deserve death by mutilation. In fact, Beverly Katz didn't _deserve_ death at all. But she couldn't be kept alive either. Not with the evidence she had found.

As Lecter reached a gentle hand out to her, Beverly didn't flinch away. She just continued staring right through him, unwaveringly. His hand lightly cupped her face, stroking her cheek for a mere moment. Life is beautiful. There was a heaviness that weighed Hannibal's feet down like stones as he slowly circled around to behind the admirable woman whom he was about to render lifeless. He had never even wanted to entertain the thought of ending the life of Beverly Katz.

She reminded him so much of Lady Murasaki.

So much that it burned him to snatch up her slim neck in his hand. Beverly, out of pure will to live, tried to pull his arm away and pull his hand from her throat, thrashing and bucking in resistance to him. Lecter wrapped his other arm around her torso - almost like a backward hug - and caught her hands, trapping them as she struggled.

Hannibal leaned forward as he leaned Beverly to the side and back slightly, locking their eyes as she gave a terrified yelp. Beverly held his gaze once more, her eyes never leaving his as the fear bloomed across her face like a bruise. _This is it! My god, this is it..._

Hannibal didn't want to let an ounce of emotion show as he kept Beverly perfectly in place in the intimate position, though her fighting didn't cease. But he knew that that's what she needed. A little sliver of comfort, something to comfort her as she went under. So, just for a mere second, he let her see just how much pain doing this to her caused him.

The moment he had done that, suddenly it was not Beverly that was slowly going unconscious against him. It was Lady Murasaki and Hannibal felt the foreign pain in his chest stab into him like the white hot blade of a knife. The feeling caught him by such surprise that he almost let go of Katz, his grip loosening exponentially. She writhed harder than she ever had before, the hope of escape swelling in her chest. But that hope was soon diminished as Lecter's hand gripped her neck with more force and he pulled her back.

Beverly's knees were weak, her feet sliding out slowly from beneath her as she let out a final guttural moan of protest before she felt her vision clouding over. As her head became light and she felt the hand around her neck loosen, the arm around her torso beginning to gently ease her down to the ground...her eyes locked onto that little ray of light once more. Soon, her body felt warm and fuzzy. She was comfortable, not cold and quivering as she thought she would have been. Her eyes never left the light, never once strayed away. And then everything was black.

Beverly's body went limp and Hannibal finally let go of her neck, easing her to the ground until he made sure that she wouldn't fall. He finally let the pain become evident on his face. His eyebrows furrowed, his posture was slightly slumped, but most of all, his eyes were the eyes of someone that had just lost someone that they loved very, _very_ much. Every time he looked at Beverly now, he had to fight away images of Lady Murasaki that kept trying to replace her.

Hannibal knelt to his knee next to her unconscious form. He had only meant to cut off the flow of oxygen to her brain, not to kill her by strangulation. He, with a slight air of hesitance, let his fingers brush lightly through her hair, studying her face. He gently eased the tense muscles in her forehead and jaw so she looked much more peaceful. He parted her mouth just a little. It added the illusion of a little smile, but also softened her features. Running the back of his hand lightly over her cheekbone, he took in a breath and sunk down so he was sitting next to her.

"I am so sorry that I did this to you." He whispered, feeling his throat and chest tighten with sadness. Tears did not come easily to the man when they were natural, not faked. But these tears were real, even though he held them back.

Then, giving his head a slight shake, Hannibal picked the unconscious Beverly up bridal-style and walked quickly, with purpose, to a huge freezer the size of ones used in restaurants. As he passed by his captives, they immediately hushed up and stilled their shaking, watching his movements with their eyes until he was out of sight.

Hannibal opened the door of the freezer, holding Beverly with one arm, her head and one arm draped over his shoulder. He shivered involuntarily as the blast of extremely cold air hit him before baring it and stalking inside. He laid Beverly down gently on the floor of the freezer before leaving, closing and latching the door behind him.

* * *

Beverly Katz woke up with a weak gasp, her senses being assaulted by extreme cold. Her limbs felt stiff, she could barely move at all. She could feel the crustiness of ice on her eyelids and in her hair. A little flutter of panic surged through her as she realized what she was in and what was happening to her, the tears that came to her eyes froze immediately upon touching her almost frozen skin.

"No...no, no, no...no..." She whimpered almost unintelligibly, shaking her head a miniscule amount. It was that time that the door creaked open and Hannibal Lecter - clad in a thick wool coat, a hat, and gloves - entered Beverly's death chamber. She looked at him, fear and confusion evident in her eyes, although her face was almost completely frozen solid.

"Oh no." Hannibal breathed and then he was walking quickly toward Beverly, an air of calm and controlled panic about him, "Oh, Beverly no..."

Beverly's confusion must have been blatantly obvious.

"You were never supposed to wake up. You were supposed to stay unconscious while this happened." As he said this, Hannibal knelt next to Beverly, looking at her with almost as much sadness as she was feeling.

But Beverly knew that it wasn't because it was _her_, but because she must have reminded him of someone from his past. When Beverly had thought she was never going to wake up again, she had wished she had known more about the good doctor. Now was her chance to learn.

"Who was she?" Beverly rasped out, her voice weak as she had ever heard it. Hannibal tilted his head in confusion, "The woman that I remind you of...who was she?"

Lecter swallowed and almost refrained from telling Beverly who it was, but he decided against it. These were her last moments. He could hear her pounding pulse beginning to slow as she spoke.

"Her name was Lady Murasaki, she was my aunt by marriage. She took me in after my uncle died and I escaped from my boarding school." He said softly, almost unaware that he had taken Beverly's hand in his, was stroking it softly.

"You...loved her...didn't you?" Beverly inquired, her words breaking from the shivering of her jaw, her heavy strained breathing interrupting their flow. She knew it was coming soon.

Hannibal merely nodded, unable to bring himself to say the simple three letter word.

"I told her that I wanted to stop killing, to run away with her and live a normal life." He paused, his eyes falling to the floor, "She refused, said that she couldn't love a monster...that was the last time I ever saw her."

Beverly thought that the story was tragic, like a Shakespearean play. Perfectly fitting for Hannibal Lecter, though. So much so, that she could have laughed if she had had the strength to. Even in his teenaged years, he was over-the-top. But Beverly couldn't even bring herself to smile.

"T-T-T...Tell me a-about...her..." She felt her eyelids beginning to grow even heavier, but she forced them to stay open as her breathing started turning shallow, hollow.

"She was exquisite." Lecter said quickly, a genuine smile appearing on his face at the thought of her, "Intelligent, compassionate, strong-willed, determined. Confident, defiant. The most beautiful woman I've ever had the opportunity to lay my eyes on." He gave Beverly's hand a squeeze, which she returned. She kept holding onto his hand with surprising strength.

He was her tether to this world...yet also her executioner.

Her breathing escalated, her breaths coming in short, quick bursts. _I'm almost there..._

"She was exactly like you, Beverly Katz. She was a _fighter_."

Beverly's eyes had never once left Hannibal's face, until the moment he told her to look away.

"Look outside, Beverly...look at the light." He murmured, stroking her hair now, looking into her bright eyes for what he knew would be the last time before they went dim.

As Beverly did, she felt her chest swell with a burst of happiness. There...through the darkness and framed by chains and the forms of Abigail Hobbs and Miriam Lass...was Beverly's little ray of light. It shone like a beacon, calling out to her. It was beautiful. Like a light from heaven, it made everything a little brighter, a little more peaceful. Abigail and Miriam were like angels coming to guide her. It was then that Beverly understood why the Angel Maker had done what he had done.

Beverly felt a small smile come across her lips and she kept her hold on Lecter's hand as he kept soothingly stroking her hair. Her shivering was stopping, she was less cold now. She felt like she was just...slipping into a warm bath...letting the water wash over her.

"Will...I never got...I never got to say goodbye to Will..." She whispered, trying to fight the black spots creeping into her vision. She wasn't ready to go yet, she didn't want to go!

"It is not goodbye, Miss Katz. You will see him again. You will see everyone that you love again, in the end." Hannibal's voice was beginning to fade away, like she was floating away and leaving him, leaving everyone, behind.

Suddenly, in a last moment of strength, Beverly squeezed Hannibal's hand and, never taking her eyes off the ray of light, whispered.

"_I gotcha._"

Hannibal felt a small smile creep onto his face as he squeezed her hand in return, holding onto her tightly.

"Yes...yes, you did."

But Beverly never let go of her little ray of light. Of her little ray of hope. Not even as the black spots started to crawl further into her vision. Soon - too soon - a blanket of darkness was overtaking her mind, overtaking her eyesight, her body...extinguishing her labored breath, her struggling heart, her life...and her little ray of hope.

But Beverly Katz did not die crying. No.

Beverly Katz died with a breathy chuckle and a welcoming smile.

Beverly Katz died **happy**.

* * *

Death makes angels of us all,

And gives us wings where we had shoulders

Smooth as ravens' claws


End file.
